Alan Bennett’s ‘The History Boys’: This Summer’s Analogy

It is not very often that I read plays, especially modern plays. Being a Classics student, I have often revelled in the great works of Sophocles or Euripides, and I have also ‘revelled’ in Shakespeare’s The Tempest. However, theatre has almost become a thing of the past, becoming replaced by film and major Broadway productions. Even The History Boys was made into a film, starring the original cast from the stage production. Now we are reliant on playwrights, such as Alan Bennett or Tom Stoppard (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern) to redefine the theatre as an art form.

Of course, the success of The History Boys was in no way hindered by the film created post-stage. Yet its poignancy and message have been designed for the theatre and, having both read the play and seen the film, I can in some way confirm this.

That is not to say that the film is bad by any means. With the cast (including James Cordon and Dominic Cooper) achieving their successes from the stage, the film almost feels like a play. I’ve noticed that on the stage, an emotion can only be conveyed in an exaggerated fashion, so as to be conveyed to a far-off viewer. For a film it is the contrary, where techniques such as camera angles or complex body language can do this successfully. Whilst this way is just as, if not more, powerful, it almost seems lazier. However, the exaggerations are not compromised in the film, with suitable annunciation in most cases and the overly-witty responses, which only represent the theatrical nature of the film.

The quality of the actors is one huge selling point of the film, but of course, it ain’t the only thing. It was also Bennett’s job to create a production which conveys the message which he intends to convey, but also make the production simultaneously inquisitive, hilarious and heart-breaking.

And on his part, it is a huge success.

The History Boys revolves around eight working class students who, intending to study History at Oxbridge, have returned for a term to prepare for the examinations and interviews. This is done with the aid of three teachers with radically different teaching viewpoints and techniques: Hector is a veteran who believes that words and culture are most important in defining a young man. Mrs Lintott believes in teaching a curriculum to the best understanding. Irwin is a young supply teacher who wants to make History an exciting discipline again. And the Headmaster is obsessed with league tables.

This play, through these three teachers, addresses a long standing issue of viewpoints on education. What is it really there to offer? How important is it really? Of course, there are many answers to these questions, all possessed by these teachers, and also the students of our day. It has taken me almost three years to not complete my Bronze Duke of Edinburgh Award due to sheer boredom and riotous behaviour against the bureaucratic nature of everything. However, some people have lapped it up. In this case, when university entry is the overall prize, these things are done solely for the purpose of university entry. D of E was created in order to allow less privileged students to have the opportunity to help the community, learn a new skill and have some general fun. Now, it is used to get into university.

It is claimed that programmes, such as D of E, are necessary as they allow you to obtain UCAS points. These are supposed to get you into university, however its nature still eludes me to this day. This has given me a lot of comic relief in quizzing the sorts of people doing D of E concerning the nature of a UCAS point.

Does reading give you UCAS points?

What is the books are really small?

What is they contain lots of pictures?

What if you are blind in one eye?

This has allowed me to come to the conclusion that, in fact, nobody knows what they are talking about. Apparently I have UCAS points. And that is lovely. But I’m not sure why…

This idea is not much expressed in The History Boys, given that these sorts of ideas only came into play recently. However, teachers such as Irwin are fixated by teaching the boys how to ‘stand out’ amongst the other prospective History students from more privileged backgrounds. He does this by branding their essays as ‘dull’, and telling them to stand out by arguing on the contrary to their actual stance which, if you ever try it, is extremely fun.

However, the viewpoint taken by the more naive of our community is that you can partake in activities in order to broaden your character INSTEAD of in order to get into university. This stance is stressed by Hector, who encourages the students to study French, recite poetry and watch films that no one else has heard of. This has set up some of the most hilarious scenes of literature I have ever read (though sometimes a decent knowledge of French is helpful).

Being potential Oxbridge candidates ourselves, many of my friends will be using this Summer to cram their heads with enough co-syllabic knowledge to get them an interview at a good university. This action, and its consequences, are perfectly displayed in Bennett’s The History Boys. Is it the correct thing to do? I guess it depends on who you are and your own reasons for going to university in the first place. But The History Boys is a witty, subtle, moving and immensely funny ode to what our lives seem to have become, and is undoubtedly worth a read.

Homer’s Iliad

Never did the idea of reviewing a work of the sort of calibre and stature as the Iliad ever even cross my mind.

Considering this overly keen and excited attitude, it was striking how many people I came across whilst reading the Iliad who had never even heard of it, so I do feel it necessary to provide a brief overview. The Iliad is the first epic poem of two by the legendary Greek poet Homer, the other being the Odyssey. It is a 24-book, 500 page roller coaster set within the final weeks of the Siege of Troy, a city thought to be part of Northern Turkey, by the Greek forces. However, when Achilles, the god-like hero of the Greek forces, refuses to fight having been insulted by the Greek leader Agamemnon, the Greeks turn onto the back foot, until the untimely death of Achilles’ close friend Patroclus, which alters the course of the siege.

Studying this work in the original work, as I have done, has a surprisingly profound effect on the reader’s view of the work (which is interesting, as it wasn’t written down until almost 300 years after Homer’s death, having previously been spread by bards). This initial method of the disclosure of the story has, nonetheless had an equally profound effect on the stylistic techniques used by Homer. He write in a meter called ‘iambic hexameter’, which consists of six ‘parts’ per line, each containing two or three syllables, which totals up to a total number which is normally reflective of the speed of the scene in question. (Any students of Shakespeare may be knowledgeable of his own meter, ‘iambic pentameter’, which consists of five ‘parts’).

Also, as it was originally made to be told by bards, Homer has been left with the seemingly impossible task of setting scenery not only through part length, but also through many other aspects, namely vocabulary and even sound of word. Often, a scene of death may be partnered with a particularly violent sound, such as that of a sword, merged into his choice of word, which makes it all the more magical to study in the original Greek. Even word order played a part, where a certain position would place emphasis on the word of Homer’s choice.

T0 sum up the last few paragraphs, for a student of literature or language, Homer’s Iliad has its aspects of interest even before you consult the story itself. However, considering that my A-level Classical Greek class consists of one other person, it is appreciated that the Iliad would be read in English, as I did over half term. So here is my take on a review of one of the forefronts of Western literature.

Remember what I said about the death of Patroclus? It struck me that this incident, which many would describe as the pivotal event of the Siege of Troy, occurred in Book 16, about 300 pages into the book. Promised with the prospect of raging chaos caused by the wrath of Achilles upon the poor Trojan soldiers, this seemed to be a bit of a let down. With various plot points mixed in, such as the final meeting between the Trojan hero, Hektor, and his wife Andromache (a beautiful scene in Book 6) and an attempt to persuade Achilles to fight in Book 9, unfortunately, not much really happened, other than various skirmishes of varying success.

These long expanses of almost dreary warfare often act as a way of describing the war among the gods. Whilst Hera (queen of the gods) and Poseidon (king of the sea) support the Greek forces (referred to as ‘Achaeans’ throughout the poem), Aphrodite (goddess of beauty) and Ares (goddess of war) support the Trojans. Throughout the entire Iliad, every stab of the spear or toss of a javelin is monitored and altered by the gods fighting for each side, which almost provides an entirely new take on the story as a disagreement between the Olympian gods. It would mean that ultimately, regardless of the strength of Trojan Hektor or Greek Achilles, this fight would be sorted out by the gods themselves.

However, despite my idea of ‘dreary warfare’, these parts prior to the death of Patroclus are dotted with strokes of literary genius on Homer’s account. The parting of Hektor and Andromache (which provides an edge of inspiration for the play ‘Trojan Women’ by Euripides) not only shows the paternal side to Hektor (who is often referred to using the epithet ‘man-slaying’), it also emphasises the effects of war on the observers, namely the women. Here, the focus is concentrated on members of Hektor’s family, such as Andromache and Hecabe (his mother), who is the protagonist of Euripides’ play. Scenes like this have also regarded points of view which may have been more central to Homer himself, here regarding the idea of pacifism and the horrors of war.

This theme of the horrors of war also has its interests for the modern historian. The other day, I attended a fascinating lecture at Manchester University entitled ‘Homeric Mud in the Trenches’, which concerned the on-running theme of mud and dirt within both the Iliad and World War I. It’s interesting because the speaker mentioned classically trained students in Britain (picture Hugh Laurie’s character of Lieutenant George in the fourth series of Blackadder) who were blinded by the idea ‘Dulce et Decorum est; pro Patria mori’ (It is sweet and proper to do for one’s country), which may have provided a thought of dying a glorious death on battlefields kissed by the sun of ‘rosy-fingered dawn’ (another Homeric epithet).

However, the theme of mud may counter this idea, as a use of mud is the elimination of glory, not the creation. In Book 21, Achilles has a battle against the River Scamander, which he fills with the blood of the Trojan soldiers who he has slaughtered. The river, speaking as a god, threatens to flood Achilles, drowning him in mud so deep that no trace of his bones or armour would be found. The thought of an improper burial of the Greek hero Achilles would have been extremely damaging for the Greeks, especially as Patroclus’ dying wish had been for Achilles’ ashes to be mixed with his own after death. Here, mud does not signify glory at all, as implied by these naive scholars of Classics, but does the total opposite.

One other aspect of Homer’s masterpiece that really defines the work is the characters; both the number of them and their personalities. This story takes place in the ‘Golden Age’ long before the era of Classical Athens, where the gods and god-like figures lived among mortals. But these characters, and Homer’s representation of them, is a definite theme for debate.

Whilst this may not be Homer’s purpose, it seems to me that the Trojans are seen as the victims, whereas the Greeks are more powerful, mainly due to the presence of Achilles. Because of this, there is a certain air of arrogance amongst the Greeks (except in Book 15, when the Trojans bring down the walls of the Greek camp). Achilles is a prime example.

In my opinion, Achilles is an utter prick.

This idea was established right at the beginning and still held strong after Book 24. Achilles refuses to fight, in full knowledge that the Greeks cannot overpower the Trojans without his ‘superpowers’, simply because Agamemnon lashed out at him a bit. So he sits in the camp with his ‘friend’ Patroclus whilst the soldiers, with reliance on Achilles, are dying at the hands of the Trojans. (I put ‘friend’ in apostrophes because he is a horrible friend who takes Patroclus for granted. Mind you, Patroclus is as weak as you would expect him to be, until he starts fighting in Book 16). Patroclus’ fighting was actually instigated by Achilles again, who convinced him to go out with his armour, meaning that people would mistake him for Achilles and morale would rise. However, Achilles wasn’t thinking about Hektor and Euphorbus, another Trojan, who finished him off after he had killed over 50 men. But the way in which Achilles puts Patroclus at risk in this way is, to me, truly disgusting. In fact, Achilles’ arrogant and angry character is left unblemished until Book 24, where it involves Priam, the Trojan king, who is mourning the death of all of his sons, who had all been killed by Achilles, including god-like Hektor, hero of the Trojans. It takes a grieving old man who is upset only due to the actions of Achilles, to make Achilles show the slightest sliver of empathy.

Yet it seems to be a different story for the Trojans. Take Hektor as an example. Throughout the Iliad (as within this post), Hektor is referred to as ‘god-like’, but his immortality is also stressed, being the son of two mortals (unlike Achilles, who was son of the nymph Thetis). His portrayal by the other Trojans offers his original character as the only possible saviour of his beloved Troy. Yet along with this, the paternal love he expresses for his young son, Astaianax, and his wife and mother shows his side whilst off the battlefield. In Book 6, Homer mentions that Astaianax shrunk away from Hektor when he was wearing his plumed helmet, yet when he removed it, he held his child. This shows that Hektor the hero is almost a different person to Hektor the father. And whilst all of the aspects of Achilles’ character imply nastiness, Hektor’s characteristics only resonate positivity.

In conclusion (to what is probably the longest post I’ve done by a good 600 lines), this masterpiece is full of content and subtext which is fascinating for debate and discussion. It is unsurprising that within the Oxford University Classics course, 20% of the first year is spent studying this book alone. Whilst it may not agree for everyone at this very moment, it is a truly important book that I profoundly believe ought to be read by everybody. So I strongly suggest that at some point in the near future, you read Homer’s Iliad. It may seem slow at first, but persevere, for the overall result is phenomenal.